Free Republic

A Raised Middle Finger Is Protected Free Speech, Appeals Court Rules By Jacey Fortin March 18, 2019 A raised middle finger is a form of free speech, a court has ruled, allowing a lawsuit by a driver who made the vulgar gesture at a police officer. The decision came from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit last week, but it started with a spirited exchange in June 2017, when a woman gave the middle-finger salute to a police officer who had just written her a ticket. The woman, Debra L. Cruise-Gulyas, had been driving over the...

full Title: Brutal moment a New Jersey Transit police officer drags and punches an unreponsive man outside station Police have launched an internal investigation after a cellphone video surfaced showing what appears to be one of their officers punching a man in the head and dragging him across the pavement...(snip) Speaking to WPVI, the woman who recorded the footage said the cop continued berating and dragging the man across the concrete for another five minutes.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – A fired Florida police officer was found guilty of manslaughter and attempted murder Thursday for fatally shooting a stranded black motorist, becoming the first officer in the state to be convicted of an on-duty shooting in 30 years. Nouman Raja, 41, faces a mandatory minimum of 25 years at sentencing April 26, and could spend his life in prison for the death of Corey Jones, 31. The four-man, two-woman jury deliberated for four hours. Raja didn't react as the verdict was read. About 25 relatives and supporters of Jones looked on, some weeping. One said...

CENTER CITY (FOX 29) - Video shows Taco Bell employees in an altercation with a customer in Center City. The customer says the employees “snapped” when people complained of long wait times for food. A week after he was beaten up buying tacos, Bryan Reese is speaking out about the incident caught on video the night of Feb. 24. The 32-second clip shows workers wearing Taco Bell uniforms running outside the restaurant near 11th and Chestnut. The video shows Reese getting punched in the ribs while someone else is holding him down. The customer says the employees “snapped” when people...

FULL TITLE: US-Somali cop who shot dead an Australian woman in her pyjamas 'pointed a gun at a driver's head months earlier after stopping him for not using his indicator' The US-Somali cop accused of fatally shooting an Australian woman outside her home had brandished his gun on a driver during a traffic stop months earlier, it has been revealed. Dashcam footage has emerged showing former Minneapolis police officer Mohamed Noor, 33, pointing his weapon at a driver after he had stopped him for allegedly not using his turn signal in May 2017. Noor has been charged with second-degree intentional...

white Detroit Police officer is under internal investigation following a Snapchat video during which the officer can be heard saying "Bye, Felicia" as he records a young black woman walking home in frigid temperatures.

Thousands of California law enforcement officers have been convicted of a crime in the past decade, according to records released by a public agency that sets standards for officers in the Golden State. The revelations are alarming, but the state’s top cop says Californians don’t have a right to see them. In fact, Attorney General Xavier Becerra warned two Berkeley-based reporters that simply possessing this never-before-publicly-released list of convicted cops is a violation of the law. “It’s disheartening and ominous that the highest law enforcement officer in the state is threatening legal action over something the First Amendment makes clear...

The Supreme Court has just put the clamps on states’ ability to impose excessive fines and use civil asset forfeiture to seize private property. On Wednesday February 20, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that the Eight Amendment’s ban on excessive fines also applies to states. This landmark ruling bolsters property rights and could curtail controversial law enforcement seizures, especially those carried out via civil forfeiture. In the decision, Timbs v. Indiana, the Supreme Court sided with small time drug offender Tyson Timbs, whose $42,000 Land Rover was seized by law enforcement officials. Civil asset forfeiture is one of...

The lead investigator and long term Houston Police Department undercover narcotics Officer Gerald Goines lied to obtain a no-knock warrant. The no-knock warrant lead to the death of a middle-aged couple, their dog, and the wounding of four officers, at 7815 Harding Street on 28 January 2019. From abc13.com: The search warrant clearly shows the initial information used to obtain the no-knock search warrant involved a number of lies.In the original warrant obtained on Jan. 28, the lead case agent, Officer Gerald Goines, wrote that a confidential informant bought heroin at the house the day before the drug raid....

Houston cop 'lied about drug dealing so officers could storm home' sparking a shootout which left a couple dead and five officers wounded The Houston officer who led a deadly raid in which a couple were killed and five cops were injured lied to get a search warrant, according to the city's police chief. Lead investigator Gerald Goines alleged an informant bought heroin at the house of Dennis Tuttle, 59, and Rhogena Nicholas, 58, the day before the January 28 raid. The informant had also allegedly seen a handgun in the home. But according to an affidavit filed as part...

HOUSTON - The story from Houston Police Department narcotics officers surrounding a drug raid-turned-shootout that left five officers injured and two people dead doesn’t add up, according to a warrant reviewed by Channel 2 Investigates on Friday. The warrant was requested by an HPD sergeant with the Special Investigations Unit, regarding the controversial raid at 7815 Harding St. on Jan. 28. In the legal documents obtained by Channel 2 Investigates, a sergeant stated that he along with his partner were unable to track down any confidential informants involved in a drug buy at the home of 58-year-old Rhogena Nicholas and...

The Houston Police Department has released the inventory of items seized during the execution of the no-knock raid where 59-year-old Dennis Tuttle and his wife, 58-year-old Rhogena Nicholas were shot and killed. The raid occurred on January 28, 2019.The married couple of 20 years died in a gun battle with police where four officers were wounded, and one was injured while taking cover. The couple had no criminal records. They had occupied the house for 20 years. Rhogena was as a supporter of President Trump. Dennis was a Navy veteran.The gun battle started when the police broke down their...

The Houston Police officers who conducted a deadly raid in an East Houston home on January 28, expecting to find heroin, only seized 18 grams of marijuana and 1.5 grams of an unknown white powder. The Houston Chronicle obtained the results of the search warrant Friday, which also showed officers found two shotguns and two rifles inside the house. The house had been under investigation for about two weeks after HPD received information about a suspect that was allegedly selling narcotics. A confidential informant was sent to purchase heroin from the suspect on January 27. The informant told officers the...

On July 27, 2017, Johnny Wheatcroft was a passenger in a silver Ford Taurus when a pair of Glendale police officers pulled in front them in a Motel 6 parking lot. The stop was for an alleged turn signal violation. Minutes later, Wheatcroft was handcuffed lying face down on the hot asphalt on a 108-degree day. He'd already been tased 10 times, with one officer kneeling on his back as another, Officer Matt Schneider, kicked him in the groin and pulled down his athletic shorts to tase him a final time in his testicles, according to a federal lawsuit and...

A veteran Houston police narcotics officer has been relieved of duty due to "ongoing questions" that have emerged over his role in a raid last week that ended in a deadly mid-afternoon shootout, police said Thursday. "We have confirmed that at least one narcotics officer has been relieved of duty due to ongoing questions that cannot be answered until the case agent is interviewed," HPOU President Joe Gamaldi said in a written statement. "The department made the decision to relieve the officer of duty while a thorough investigation continues. Nearly all officers relieved of duty return to work quickly after...

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall today released a report saying a Hoover police officer was justified in the fatal shooting of 21-year-old Emantin "E.J." Bradford Jr. at the Riverchase Galleria on Thanksgiving night. Along with his report, Marshall released surveillance video of the shooting. "Officer 1 reasonably exercised his official duties, powers, or functions when he shot E.J. Bradford on the night of November 22, 2018," Marshall concluded. "Accordingly, Alabama law declares his action “justified and not criminal.” Ala. Code § 13A-3-22. Because Officer 1 did not commit a crime under Alabama law, Rule 3.8(1)(a) of the Alabama Rules of...

The recent killing of a couple in Houston, Texas, and the wounding of four police officers, has been claimed to be an ambush of police by drug dealers. Later accounts by officers at the scene show that police broke into the house, and fired first, killing the couple's dog.The husband then fired back, wounding the officer who killed their dog. Officers then shot the unarmed 58-year-old wife. They claim she was attempting to get the shotgun from the wounded officer. From cnn.com: When Monday afternoon's raid was over, two suspects were dead and five officers were injured, four of...

The officers were reportedly playing a Russian roulette-style game, taking turns pointing a weapon at one another and firing, with only one bullet in the chamber.

For nearly six full weeks, 29-year-old Matt Crull said he sat inside a Florida jail for a crime he didn’t commit. The charge was trafficking heroin, according to CBS12. It came with a steep potential punishment and bond, which frightened Crull, who said an officer mistook laundry detergent for heroin. “(It’s) very surreal when you’re sitting in jail with a half a million dollars bond,” Crull told WPBF25, “and you can’t go anywhere knowing that you didn’t do wrong. “In the past, when I have gone to jail, it’s been something where I knew I wasn’t going to be there...

A St. Louis police officer has been charged with killing a fellow officer after a Russian roulette-style game went horribly wrong. Nathaniel Hendren, 29, was charged Friday with involuntary manslaughter and armed criminal action, according to Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner and a probable cause statement. Hendren, who was on-duty at the time of the shooting, and Katlyn Alix were allegedly playing a game where all but one bullet was removed from a revolver and the two would take turns pointing it at each other and pulling the trigger, according to the probable cause document.